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Short version: There's probably a very interesting story to be told about the great diaspora from Vulcan following Surak and the development of interstellar flight in the 40 Eridani system.

The existence of multiple Vulcanoid populations dating from the time of Surak outside of the Vulcan and Romulan spheres of influence makes the whole question of Vulcan-Romulan reunification more complex. At the very least, the Rigelians are close to the Federation, but they've remained sufficiently distinct to be counted as a population distinct from both the Romulans and the Vulcans. Maybe talk of reunification isn't sop much about setting up a Vulcanoid state but rather about ending the divisive legacies of the planetary war that produced the diaspora.

Folks, this is getting dangerously close to story-idea territory. Probably best to curb speculation about where the Vulcanoid Rigellians came from.

As it happens -- and I should've clarified this already -- I've done a fair amount of research and thinking on the inhabitants of the Rigel system as background for Rise of the Federation. As it happens, Nasat's thinking on the overall system comes pretty close to what I'd arrived at. I count three main native races, one each from Rigel III (Chelons), IV (Vulcanoids), and V (beaded Rigelians from ENT season 4). Rigel II has colonies from both IV and V, going by Catalyst of Sorrows. As for the Kaylar... well, I may get around to explaining that in a book.

rfmcdpei wrote:

Going by this transcript of "Journey to Babel", Spock's line is "Rigelian physiology is very similar to Vulcan". It's not just a matter of blood chemistry, but the entire Rigelian organism is similar to the Vulcan. Especially since there were sufficient differences between recently-separated Romulans and Vulcans to complicate Crusher's treatment of a Romulan downed on Galorndon Core a century later, it's not unreasonable to speculate that Rigelians are as roughly closely related to Vulcans as Romulans.

Well, I'll grant that they said "physiology," but I don't agree with the second point. Two populations can have very similar physiology in one respect yet very different in another. For instance, two people with the same kind of colorblindness may have incompatible blood types, or two people with the same immunity to a given disease may have different degrees of lactose tolerance. It depends on what physiological factors are medically relevant in a given context.

When did this divergence take place? It may be that the Rigelians descend from an Arretian-era population.

I already pretty much established, or at least strongly suggested, in Watching the Clock that the Arretians were actually two species coexisting as a single civilization -- one (most likely Sargon's race) that was the ancestor of many humanoid aliens (such as, perhaps, Bajorans, Betazoids, Deltans, Argelians, etc.), and one (most likely Henoch's race) that was the ancestor of Vulcanoid species (Vulcans, Romulans, Rigellians, perhaps Halanans, maybe even Ocampa).

Looking at Memory Beta's page, it seems that the consensus has been to write the Rigelians as a Vulcanoid population that emigrated from 40 Eridani at roughly the same time as the Rigelians.

That "consensus" comes mainly from two things, an RPG module and the novel Mind Meld. RPG versions of Trek history are rarely followed by the novel continuity, and Mind Meld's portrayal of Rigel V isn't consistent with what ENT and Catalyst of Sorrows established. So I'm not going with that interpretation.

__________________Christopher L. Bennett Homepage -- Site update 11/16/14 including annotations for "The Caress of a Butterfly's Wing" and overview for DTI: The Collectors

Regarding Rigel, and the odd dialogue on the star system of that name in "Broken Bow"... What does the novelverse say about Beta Rigel or its relationship to the more familiar Rigel in the Orion constellation, exactly?

In the Carey novelization of "Broken Bow", Archer associates the word "Rigel" with the blue giant in the Orion constellation, hundreds of lightyears from Earth, despite T'Pol explicitly saying it's a star system just fifteen lightyears away from their current position. There's no room for "Beta Rigel" there, not unless we assume Archer is a moron and has no idea where his ship currently sails, and never grasps the fact that his team hasn't visited the constellation Orion star system. And even then there'd be a little bit of an oddity between warp 4.4 being only thirty million kilometers per second, their destination being just 80 hours away, and the ship still being within 15 ly of the "real" Rigel...

A silver-scaled Rigellian captain, Alonis Cobaryn, was in "Starfleet: Year One", and I once wrote to MJF asking if he'd intended this species to be a Chelonian-type Rigellian, ie. as created for ST:TMP (where the green sabre-toothed turtle aliens had made silver metal armored shells because they'd evolved out of their ancestors' ones). But he said, no, it was a new, original Rigellian. The species was also in "Stargazer: Oblivion".

Regarding Rigel, and the odd dialogue on the star system of that name in "Broken Bow"... What does the novelverse say about Beta Rigel or its relationship to the more familiar Rigel in the Orion constellation, exactly?

There was a typo in "Star Trek Star Charts" that was intended to clarify the Rigel of ENT and the distant Rigel of "The Cage":

The Rigel Colonies' star, Beta Rigel, as depicted in ENT, was considered by that book to be different to "true" Rigel (ie. Beta Orionis A). The seventh planet of Beta Orionis A is home to the Kaylar.

A silver-scaled Rigellian captain, Alonis Cobaryn, was in "Starfleet: Year One", and I once wrote to MJF asking if he'd intended this species to be a Chelonian-type Rigellian, ie. as created for ST:TMP (where the green sabre-toothed turtle aliens had made silver metal armored shells because they'd evolved out of their ancestors' ones). But he said, no, it was a new, original Rigellian. The species was also in "Stargazer: Oblivion".

That's not what I asked. I said "Where in SCE" were they mentioned?

__________________Christopher L. Bennett Homepage -- Site update 11/16/14 including annotations for "The Caress of a Butterfly's Wing" and overview for DTI: The Collectors